Table Of ContentDevelopmental Psychology and
Young Children’s Religious
Education
Developmental Psychology and Young Children’s Religious Education sets out
to identify the conceptual pre-requisites for young children’s religious
education learning and clearly highlights the challenges that children and
their teachers encounter in the RE educational process.
Based on a study with 431 children aged 5 to 7 years from different
schools, faith and non-faith, and 47 teachers from the same schools as the
children, this book offers an insightful look into younger children’s religious
education, providing statistical evidence to dismantle the belief that young
children lack the ability to conceptualise God in abstract terms. The
information obtained from these children and their teachers reveals a
major discrepancy between the teachers’ perceptions of young children’s
conceptual abilities for RE learning, on the one hand, and children’s actual
abilities revealed in their responses throughout the study, on the other.
Based on the evidence described in the volume, Petrovich argues that
teacher-training courses for primary RE need to be designed to include a
substantial component of contemporary developmental research that is of
direct relevance to children’s conceptual abilities and understanding of
abstract concepts.
Developmental Psychology and Young Children’s Religious Education is
essential reading for students and researchers in developmental psychology,
religious education, teacher education, education studies and cultural
anthropology.
Olivera Petrovich is a developmental psychologist in the Department of
Experimental Psychology at the University of Oxford, UK. Her research
deals with the development of religious understanding in children and adults
from different cultures.
Developmental Psychology
and Young Children’s
Religious Education
Olivera Petrovich
Cover image: My First Sermon by John Everett Millais, 1863 © City of
London Corporation
First published 2022
by Routledge
4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2022 Olivera Petrovich
The right of Olivera Petrovich to be identified as author of this work has
been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or
other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying
and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN: 978-0-367-43619-3 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-367-43620-9 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-00463-9 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003004639
Typeset in Times New Roman
by MPS Limited, Dehradun
Contents
List of figures vii
List of tables ix
Preface xi
Acknowledgements xiii
1 Introduction 1
2 Research design and fieldwork: Rationale and method 15
3 Children’s perceptions of and attitudes to school RE:
Interview findings 21
4 Everyday religious understanding: The natural-
theological reasoning test 41
5 Children’s concepts of God: Everyday and RE-based 59
6 Teachers’ perceptions of young children’s abilities for
RE learning 77
7 Religious understanding in the early years: What can
RE learn from young children? 91
8 Conclusion 97
References 109
Author Index 117
Subject Index 119
Figures
3.1 Percentages of children from different school denomina-
tions according to the amount of RE story recall. 23
3.2 Percentages of 5-, 6- and 7-year olds recalling RE story to
the level corresponding with No recall, Limited recall and
Detailed recall. 24
3.3 Percentages of children from different school denomina-
tions responding to the question whether a recalled story
is about God. 25
3.4 Percentages of children from different school denominations
answering the question about the meaning of religious words
encountered in school RE. 27
3.5 Percentages of children from different school denominations
and their attitudes to school assemblies. 31
3.6 Percentages of children from different school denominations
and their judgements of RE as Both hard and easy, Hard
and Easy. 33
4.1 Mean numbers of correct responses (out of six) in the four
conditions of the Origin Task according to children’s age. 44
4.2 Mean numbers of correct responses (out of six) in the four
conditions of the Origin Task according to children’s
schools. 45
4.3.1 Reproduced with permission from Petrovich (2019). 46
4.4.1 Reproduced with permission from Petrovich (2019). 47
4.3 Mean numbers of correct responses (out of six) in the
Animacy Task according to children’s schools. 50
4.4 Mean numbers of correct responses (out of six) in the
Origin and Animacy Tasks according to children’s age. 51
4.5 Mean numbers of correct responses (out of six) in the
Origin and Animacy Tasks according to children’s schools. 51
4.6 Origin of matter: Percentages of children in each age group
selecting Eternal, Created and Neither options in response
to the first cosmological question. 55
viii Figures
4.7 Origin of matter: Percentages of children from different
schools selecting Eternal, Created and Neither options in
response to the first cosmological question. 55
4.8 God’s role in the origin of matter: Percentages of children
in each age group selecting “Matter first” and “God first”
in response to the follow-up cosmological question. 56
4.9 God’s role in the origin of matter: Percentages of children
from different schools selecting “Matter first” and “God
first” in response to the follow-up cosmological question. 57
5.1 Mean scores (out of two) on abstractness of children’s
Image of God, Image justification and Question about
God responses according to age. 63
5.2 Mean scores (out of two) on abstractness of children’s
Image of God, Image justification and Question about
God responses according to school denomination. 64
8.1 Millais’s 1864 painting “My second sermon” © Guildhall
Art Gallery (City of London Corporation). 104
Tables
3.1 Frequencies and percentages of children’s RE story recall
according to school denomination. 23
3.2 Frequencies and percentages of children’s responses to the
question about the meaning of uttered religious words
according to school denomination. 27
4.1 Mean numbers of correct responses (out of six) and standard
deviations (in parentheses) in the four conditions of the Origin
Task according to age. 44
4.2 Mean numbers of correct responses (out of six) and
standard deviations (in parentheses) in the two conditions
of the Animacy Task according to age. 49
5.1 Mean scores (out of two) with standard deviations (in
parentheses) on abstractness of Image of God, Image
justification and Question about God responses according
to age. 63
5.2 Mean scores (out of two) with standard deviations (in
parentheses) on abstractness of Image of God, Image
justification, and Question about God according to school
denomination. 64
5.3 Frequencies and percentages (in parentheses) of children’s
justifications for not having a question of interest about God. 66
